Posts tagged ‘Post Nominal Letters’

Whilst there exists a myriad of qualifications that can prove technical competence across most areas of the IT industry, how do you know that the person advising you has the skills to do so?

You can trust ‘Chartered’…..

Many professions such as mine rely on their Chartered status to build trust with consumers. Well, there now exists a Chartered status within the IT industry that is aimed at providing proof of experience, ability and breadth of knowledge.

It carries the post nominal letters CITP and is the Chartered IT Professional status which is administered by the British Computer Society.

The CITP has been setup to be the benchmark of IT excellence, it is a rigorously assessed employer led standard, and it sets out to provide all those who need IT support that the person they are dealing with has the highest standards backed up by a professional body.

If you are used to the various Microsoft Accreditations, such as the “Microsoft Certified Professional Developer” (MCPD) these are designed to show that the engineer, who is installing and configuring your equipment, has all the Microsoft skills to do it. Think of the CITP as more like being an independent project manager who would look at your whole current and future IT usage, to come up with the best solution and plan.

A holistic approach to IT solutions

Many issues with IT are caused by looking at specific parts of a system in isolation, and creating a separate solution, and for too long it has not been possible to independently ascertain if the person giving you advice has the “right” to do so – the CITP gives you that security. The Daily/Sunday Telegraph formally lists those achieving the CITP, and names of individuals are held on a detailed register.

If you are familiar with the level of professionalism and integrity that the Chartered Status provides Accountants and Architects – then you can now expect the same from the IT world.

Need advice?

So if you are looking to get some IT advice what should you look out for? Well the best advice is always to get some recommendations, ask those that you trust and see who they use. But now you can also check the integrity of anyone by seeing if they are Chartered – after all you would not trust your accounts to just anyone.